Call for Papers

Careers mediate between individuals and institutions. They are central to individuals’ identity and their quotidian activities. Individuals are obsessed with their careers: managing them, planning them, comparing them to others. At the same time, careers are conditioned by and given meaning by institutions. Institutions structure the career choices individuals consider or see as legitimate. Given the central position of careers in individuals’ lives and in institutional arrangements, it is surprising that careers are not more central in organization studies, generally, and in institutional theory specifically.
 
The intersection between careers and institutions has the potential to shape who is included and who is excluded from diverse institutional contexts. People’s career histories can lead them to develop a sense of community that is inclusive of people who from diverse backgrounds (Nigam & Dokko, 2019). People’s career backgrounds can also shape their ability to engage in work that aims to shape institutions in the effort to create a more inclusive and sustainable world (Edelman et al., 2001; Howard-Grenville et al., 2017; Wickert & de Bakker, 2018). At the same time, institutionalized structures (e.g. educational structures) and divisions (e.g., race and class) in societies can influence who gets included or excluded from particular careers (Rivera, 2016), as well as how people formulate or career trajectories in the midst of wider institutional changes in the world of work (Petriglieri et al., 2018).
 
Despite periodic observations about the value of research linking careers and institutions, empirical work on the topic has been relatively limited (Barley, 1989; Jones & Dunn, 2007; Peiperl et al., 2002). Instead, the literatures on careers and on institutions have largely evolved separately, with limited cross-fertilization. Careers research does examine institutions, though it largely emphasized the way in which larger institutions structure individuals’ careers (e.g., Gunz et al., 2007; Jones, 2001; Stovel et al., 1996; Tams & Arthur, 2010). This work has devoted less attention to exploring the relationship between careers and the core themes of institutional theory (e.g., institutional logics, institutional work, institutional actors, organizational fields). At the same time, institutional theory researchers, with some exceptions (e.g., Jones et. al., 2012; Nigam & Dokko, 2019) have devoted limited attention to explicitly theorizing the role of careers.
 
This sub-theme seeks to gather scholars working at the intersection of careers and institutions. It aims to attract careers researchers who are using a careers perspective to explore core theoretical themes in institutional theory (e.g., institutional logics, organizational fields). In addition, it aims to attract institutional scholars who are beginning to consider the role of careers in institutional processes. Our expectation is that sharing diverse work focused specifically on the intersection between careers and institutions will be generative in a way that is distinct from a broader track focused on either careers or on institutions. We anticipate that discussions across different perspectives, coming from largely distinct research communities in careers and in institutional theory, will stimulate new directions for theory and research. We plan to emphasize empirical work in this sub-theme, though we welcome theory work that brings new insight to study of careers and institutions.
 
Some possible topics for papers in the sub-theme include, but are not limited to:

• Exploring how people’s career experiences and job mobility can expose them to a multiplicity of institutional logics (e.g. how people carry new logics with them when they move between countries, industries, or societal sectors)

• Understanding how career trajectories and structures enable or constrain action to build more inclusive and sustainable institutions

• Showing how individuals cope with radical or unanticipated institutional change that disrupts their careers

• Examining how people craft careers or how institutionalized career templates form in new and emerging organizational fields

• Theorizing the bottom up processes by which diverse people’s idiosyncratic careers can create new institutional actors or new institutional logics

References

• Barley, S.R. (1989): “Careers, identities and institutions: The legacy of the Chicago School of Sociology.” In: M.B. Arthur, D.T. Hall & B.S. Lawrence (eds.): Handbook of Career Theory. New York: Harper Collins, 41–65.
• Edelman, L.B., Fuller, S.R., & Mara-Drita, I. (2001): “Diversity rhetoric and the managerialization of law.” American Journal of Sociology, 106 (6), 1589–1641.
• Gunz, H., M. Peiperl, D., & Tzabbar, D. (2007): “Boundaries in the study of career.” In: H.P. Gunz & M. Peiperl (eds.): Handbook of Career Studies. London: SAGE Publications, 471–494.
• Howard-Grenville, J., Nelson, A.J., Earle, A.G., Haack, J.A., & Young, D.M. (2017): “If chemists don’t do it, who is going to?” Peer-driven occupational change and the emergence of green chemistry.” Administrative Science Quarterly, 62 (3), 524–560.
• Jones, C. (2001): “Co-evolution of entrepreneurial careers, institutional rules and competitive dynamics in American film, 1895–1920.” Organization Studies, 22 (6), 911–944.
• Jones, C., & Dunn, M.B. (2007): “Careers and institutions: The centrality of careers to organizational studies.” In: H.P. Gunz & M. Peiperl (eds.): Handbook of Career Studies. London: SAGE Publications, 437–450.
• Jones, C., Maoret, M., Massa, F.G., & Svejenova, S. (2012): “Rebels with a cause: Formation, contestation, and expansion of the de novo category ‘modern architecture’, 1870–1975.” Organization Science, 23 (6), 1523–1545.
• Nigam, A., & Dokko, G. (2019): “Career resourcing and the process of professional emergence.” Academy of Management Journal, 62 (4), 1052–1084.
• Peiperl, M., Arthur, M., & Anand, N. (2002): Career Creativity: Explorations in the Remaking of Work. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Petriglieri, G., Petriglieri, J.L., & Wood, J.D. (2018): “Fast tracks and inner journeys: Crafting portable selves for contemporary careers.” Administrative Science Quarterly, 63 (3), 479–525.
• Rivera, L.A. (2016): Pedigree: How Elite Students Get Elite Jobs. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• Stovel, K., Savage, M., & Bearman, P. (1996): “Ascription into achievement: Models of career systems at Lloyds Bank, 1890–1970.” American Journal of Sociology, 102 (2), 358–399.
• Tams, S., & Arthur, M.B. (2010): “New directions for boundaryless careers: Agency and interdependence in a changing world.” Journal of Organizational Behavior, 31 (5), 629–646.
• Wickert, C., & de Bakker, F.G. (2018): “Pitching for social change: Toward a relational approach to selling and buying social issues.” Academy of Management Discoveries, 4 (1), 50–73.
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